Apr 16 2008
These days having a carbon savings "calculator" on your Web site is as ubiquitous as calling your company green because you recycle paper, but Phoenix-based Web conferencing firm iLinc has taken the guesswork out of CO2 savings measurement by providing its customers with the industry’s first automatic IP address-based CO2 savings application, built inside its Web conferencing software.
The Web conferencing company’s Green MeterTM uses a mathematical algorithm to detect the locations of the people that are attending a Web conference via IP address and measures the distance between the meeting participants and the meeting leader – calculating the exact amount of travel that is eliminated and measuring the amount of CO2 saved by meeting via Web conference rather than traveling. The program recognizes what means of travel would commonly be used for the distance (such as car, small aircraft, large aircraft, etc.) and keeps a running tab of the CO2 savings and its associated environmental and financial costs.
“It was during a lunch meeting some time ago with former Vice President Al Gore, a family friend from Tennessee, that I had what you might call an ‘aha’ moment,” said James M. Powers, Jr., iLinc’s President and Chief Executive Officer. “I then immediately went back to the office to get our product team working to develop the Green Meter inside the iLinc Web conferencing suite to make it a reality.”
Continued Powers, “We know there is a direct connection between Web conferencing software and environmental sustainability, so in an effort to help customers and support the worldwide movement to counteract global warming, we developed this tool to quantify the benefits of meeting online. A lot of Web sites have basic carbon calculators, but the iLinc Green Meter is a much more advanced application for measuring carbon emission savings.”
One organization seeing the benefits of the iLinc Green Meter is the State of Arizona. Across its 14 agencies currently using iLinc, the State of Arizona has saved 300,000 pounds of carbon emissions in the first quarter of 2008 alone.
“Web conferencing has the potential to significantly improve state employee productivity, reduce carbon emissions, avoid transportation costs, and increase collaboration between state and local officials in disparate parts of the state,” said Chris Cummiskey, Chief Information Officer for the State of Arizona and Director of the Government Information Technology Agency.
Increasing Demand
More organizations are increasing their awareness around environmental concerns, especially when it comes to travel. In a recent survey by the Association of Corporate Travel Executives:
- 35 percent of respondents said their company's travel department now is responsible for providing carbon emissions information, up from 20 percent in 2006,
- 36 percent reported reduced company travel as a measure for supporting sustainability, up from 23 percent a year earlier.
According to the American Express Global Business Travel Forecast released in late 2007, companies are expected to increase the focus on responsible business travel practices related to the environment.
iLinc’s Green Meter comes standard with iLinc version 9.0 and includes a variety of tools to help companies monitor and report their carbon savings. iLinc customers have saved a combined one billion pounds of CO2 so far and that number is expected to grow exponentially as more and more customers upgrade to the latest iLinc version.